Quirky Comfort
by Luna5862
Summary: Xenophilius Lovegood doesn't regret the things he's done in life, but he's not necessarily proud of them either. After the Battle of Hogwarts, everyone is concerned with picking up the pieces, but the pieces are forming a new picture no one expected.
1. Chapter 1

**From Luna5862:** Hello everyone. First off I just want to say thank you for reading my first fanfiction. Secondly, I want to remind you to read, comment, review, and share with your friends. I'll only post Author's Notes when I really need to inform you of anything, so make sure and read them! Enjoy Chapter 1 and let me know what you think!

**Chapter 1**

There are several things that Xenophilius Lovegood regretted. He regretted teaching Luna to believe in nonexistent creatures and always stare at people when she talked with them. The child was sweet and loving, everything like his beloved Jade. Xenophilius knew Luna was tortured by her peers at school because of the way he had taught her to act. How could he not know when she spent almost every night she was at home crying into her pillows? It broke his heart to see such a sweet and innocent girl tortured so, but it was unavoidable; necessary just as everything else he had done over the last sixteen years had been.

Xenophilius shook his head to get rid of the distracting thoughts as he slowly made his way down the hallways of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. With the fate of the Wizarding World hanging in the balance, the battle surrounding the school was in full swing. No one had noticed him sneak away from the front lines of Harry Potter's side, a feat of vital importance for his final act of service in the war. He still could not believe that he had agreed to kill one of his closest friend's son, but he was one of the few trusted members of the Order left and the only one who could be spared for any length of time to finish the act.

Wandering the halls in his hooded robes, Xenophilius was reminded of hi s own school days when his best friend and himself would go out searching for students out after hours to torture. Seeing shadows ahead of him in the corridor, Xenophilius ducked sideways into one of the school's many hidden passageways and crept along the outermost wall of the school. Pausing on the edge of the hidden gap between two stained glass windows, Xenophilius quickly pulled the left arm of his robes up to reveal his blank forearm. He smiled as he performed a series of complicated wand movements and whispered a string of ancient magic words, reveling in the darkening mark that was hidden there. He could easily remember his seventh year when he and Tom had snuck out and walked deep into the Forbidden Forest to perform the ancient magic that would bind them together for eternity. All that was required of him was to pay witness to Tom's first murder and swear on the blood of the small first year girl to carry a piece of Tom's soul with him until the hour of his own death.

_The moon was hidden behind storm bringing clouds, but that didn't stop the two hooded figures from racing out of the castle's large oak doors and into the darkest parts of the Forbidden Forest. Xenophilius had tried only once to convince Tom to wait for another night to perform the ancient bit of magic, but the menace in his best friend's eyes had stopped his words in their tracks. There was something about Tom when he got that look in his eyes that told Xenophilius not to cross him. The look was full of anger and revenge, but most of all it sparked with the pure evil that was slowly growing inside of Tom. Xenophilius had been friends with Tom Riddle since they first met on the Hogwarts Express six and a half years ago. He had been looking for a place to sit and found himself locked inside the luggage compartment in near total darkness by a group of seventh year Slytherins. He was terrified of dark places and had found himself wondering to the far end of the compartment to try and find a window or something to shine a little light on him. What he had found was Tom sitting on a pile of trunks speaking in a strange language to a covered cage above him._

"_What are you doing?" he had timidly asked the strange boy._

"_I'm talking to Salazar." The boy had replied calmly, turning his dark eyes to the newcomer. "What are you doing?"_

"_A bunch of seventh years locked me in here after I asked them if they'd seen any Crumple Horned Snorcacks running around the train."_

"_Crumple Horner Snorcacks you say?" the boy had asked, sliding down from the pile of trunks and coiling himself beside Xenophilius, remarkably resembling a snake. "What are Crumple Horned Snorcacks?"_

From that moment on, Xenophilius and Tom were near inseparable. It wasn't uncommon for the two of them to end up in the Headmaster's office for roaming the halls late at night after long periods of time in the library searching for information about older and darker magic than they were taught in their lessons. Of course, none of the staff knew what the boys were researching. For all they knew the boys were actually having late night rendezvous with their female classmates in the Restricted Section, and since the boys were really quite popular with the ladies, the story lead to the perfect cover-up, as long as they didn't push their luck to far and do their late research too often. Xenophilius did whatever Tom asked of him, because Tom was his only friend. Tom had been the one to arrange the tour of the magical world to search for Xenophilius's rare creatures and offered to accompany him. It had been Tom who had introduced Xenophilius to his wife, Jade Black. So it only seemed natural to Xenophilius that he did the things Tom asked him to do, which is what put him into the position he was in today: working as a double-agent for Lord Voldemort.

Xenophilius Lovegood didn't regret much about the choices he'd made in his forty-plus years, but certain aspects of being a Death Eater had always plagued him. He had never had the heart to watch people suffer, and so he had never been one to torture unnecessarily like most of his brothers and sisters. Yes, he had killed; men, women, young boys and girls. They weren't the things he was most proud of, but it had been necessary. Tom would never ask him to do something that wasn't for the greater good; or at least that's what he'd been telling himself since he had taken the Malfoys' daughter.

Hearing noises in the corridor behind him, Xenophilius removed his wand from the depths of his robes. It would be one thing for someone in the Order of the Phoenix to find him hiding in a hidden corridor; it was another for someone in the Order of the Phoenix to find him with a Dark Mark on his arm. After several minutes, the noise drifted farther down the corridor before blending once again with the roars and cries from the grounds on the other side of the stone walls. Xenophilius waited a few moments more before using his wand to conceal his Dark Mark and stowing it back inside his robes. It wasn't as if Xenophilius had any kind of personal vendetta with Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, it was just imperative to Tom's plans that the Malfoys be a part of the Death Eaters. Even though the sheer size of Lord Voldemort's ranks could have been enough to overthrow the Ministry of Magic, the Dark Lord still felt as if he needed one more thing: money. With money he could bribe members of the Ministry and buy his way into the heart of the giant and werewolf clans hidden deep within the wild of Great Britain. Voldemort tried everything to lure the Malfoys into his ranks, but the family stood firm in the Light. The Malfoys were not Mudblood lovers by any means, but the fear of the family name being destroyed after generations of building it up overshadowed their fears of being killed by the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord had then approached his dearest and oldest friend, Xenophilius Lovegood to help him solve this problem. After conferences with Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband, Xenophilius devised a way to lure the Malfoys into the Dark Lord's ranks: taking their daughter, the first Malfoy daughter in generations, and forcing their hand.

Everything had worked perfectly to plan, until the Dark Lord's defeat. Upon news of Potter's triumph and with the Ministry of Magic rushing to question known Death Eaters, Xenophilius had apparated to Malfoy Manor with every intention of killing the entire Malfoy family. He had blasted through the doors and stormed through the house, leaving a path of disaster in his wake. He had found the family in their small son's room lying on the giant four poster bed, asleep. Xenophilius had raised his wand and begun uttering the curse, when little Draco had opened his eyes and stared at him. Big grey, blue eyes had watched him with a wisdom far beyond his years; eyes that reminded him of the little girl that he and Jade had come to fall in love with. Xenophilius had lowered his wand and smiled at the small boy, waiting until he had fallen back asleep to rethink his plans.

Finally, with Ministry officials swarming the manor, Xenophilius had cast a very powerful, ancient memory charm, erasing any traces of the Malfoy daughter from the manor and the minds of its inhabitants. Xenophilius then apparated from the manor just as Ministry officials burst into the Malfoy heir's room and took the Malfoys in for questioning. As far as anyone in the Wizarding World was concerned, the Malfoys had convinced the Wizengamot that they had been held under the Imperious Curse and were in no way responsible for the many dastardly things they had done. Upon inspection of their memories, the Wizengamot found nothing to disprove these claims, which was exactly as Xenophilius had needed things to be. If word had gotten out about the Malfoy daughter being used to ensure her family's loyalties to the Dark Lord, Xenophilius himself would have been locked away in Azkaban and have been of no use to his Lord and friend.

Xenophilius did not regret the things he had done to get to this moment in his life, but he was not proud of them either. He had often wondered how his life might have turned out. Would Jade still be alive? Would he have a son or daughter of his own?

An explosion shook the castle to its very foundations, causing Xenophilius to backtrack back into the main corridor of the school. Lifting the hood of his cloak to cover his face, he began to make his way down the corridor to complete his task. Rounding a corner, Xenophilius stumbled upon a group of students battling with several Death Eaters. One by one the students began to fall or desert their comrades, all but two girls fighting side by side. One a Weasley, the other a Mudblood. Xenophilius crept up behind them, pulling his wand from his robes as he went.

"Avada Keda…"

"Bombarda!" a voice called from his left.

Xenophilius had just enough time to see a flaming ball of light rush towards him before he was thrown to his right through a stained glass window. He remembered this window, showing two people standing on the edge of a lake holding hands watching a sunset, from his school days. It was the window where he had first asked Jade to Hogsmeade and the window where he and Tom had first created the name Lord Voldemort all those many years ago. As the shattered glass fell around him, and he watched his vision go black, Xenophilius saw a pair of large grey, blue eyes staring at him filled with anger, sorrow, and wisdom far beyond the blonde haired girl's years.

**From Luna5862:** Well, that's Chapter 1. I hope you all enjoyed it and are favorite-ing this story as we speak. Chapter 2 will hopefully be up sometime in the next week or so (at the latest!). Please review and tell me what you think.


	2. Chapter 2

**From Luna5862:** Let me just apologize to everyone, especially Muffin'sback who has tried to keep me working on this, on how long it has taken to get this chapter up. I promise to put getting this story done back on my priority list. Again, I'm sorry. Forgive me?

**Chapter 2**

"_Avada Keda…"_

"_Bombarda!"_

_The flaming ball of light rushed from the tip of the wand towards the cloaked figure. The figure turned to see the spell right as it made contact with their chest. The spell had been meant to simply destroy the Death Eaters wand and knock him back slightly, but the force of it pushed the cloaked figure backwards through the stained glass window and out into the night. As the shattered glass fell around him, the cloak's hood fell back to reveal the face of Xenophilius Lovegood…_

Luna Lovegood's eyes snapped open just as lightning and thunder filled the night sky. Pouring rain and howling winds shook the house to the foundations, but Luna knew it wasn't the storm that had woken her so abruptly. She'd been reliving that night for weeks now, and every time she awoke crying. It just didn't make sense to her; either Xenophilius Lovegood, her father, had been accidently killed trying to help Ginny and Hermione fight off the Death Eaters. Or he had been about to kill Hermione and Ginny himself. Luna's heart refused to believe that her father, the kindest and gentlest man she knew, was a Death Eater, but there was something inside her that refused to dismiss the thought.

A flash of lightning illuminated the small bedroom just as the power flickered out. Luna remained lying in the bed, watching the storm rage around the house. She had never been afraid of thunderstorms or the dark, and her father had often had to drag her back inside in the middle of particularly bad storms when she would wander out to watch the majestic battle happening in the sky. She lay watching the storm for several more minutes before sighing and sitting up in bed. Grabbing a discarded hoodie off the end of her bed, Luna swung her legs off the edge of the large bed and made her way across the dark room to the door. She had been putting off going through her father's things since she had returned home, but with the funeral coming up in only a few short hours, Luna needed to put her mind at rest and find the answers to her question: was her father a Death Eater?

Luna slipped out of her bedroom, pulling a too-large hoodie over her head as she did so. The house was especially cool tonight since the storm had knocked the power out, but even with the hoodie, Luna could still feel a foreboding chill run down her spine. Once she reached the stairs, Luna made sure to keep one hand on the railing so she wouldn't fall head first down the unfamiliar staircase.

She had been happy to discover that the Order of the Phoenix and the Ministry of Magic (now headed by Kingsley Shacklebolt) had rebuilt her home for her at the end of the war, but they hadn't been able to remake the house exactly the same. While they were able to recreate the house's original rook shape, they hadn't been able to build it around the spiral staircase as it had originally been built. The staircase now ran around the inside of the outside wall of the house, which meant the farther down one went down the stairs, the wider the space on one side became, making it much easier to fall off the edge of the stairs. And the house now lacked all of the things that had made it home. Her father's research no longer lay scattered around in the house in organized chaos. The doorframes and window frames were painted to match the walls, instead of the cheery yellow Luna and her mother had painted them in an attempt to bring constant sunshine to the house. It may look like her home, but the lack of the little things made the house feel cold and empty to her.

Luna stopped in front of her father's bedroom door. She hadn't been inside since the house was rebuilt and things were being moved inside. It was just too painful to see all of his things, but they had to be gone through eventually. She had planned on waiting until after the funeral to sort through Xenophilius's things, but Luna knew she would never get back to sleep with the storm raging inside her heart.

"_It'll be worse the longer you put it off," _a small voice in her head reminded her as her hand hesitated on the doorknob. With a deep breath Luna turned the handle and pushed the door open.

Luna took a tentative step over the threshold into her father's room, looking around at the stacks of papers and boxes that covered almost every inch of space. There had been no reason to restore Xenophilius's room in Luna's mind, so everyone had simply placed everything that had belonged to him inside the room and closed the door. There was no furniture, no lamps, and no pictures, nothing to remind Luna that her father had once called this place home. Luna grabbed a stack of papers and began sifting through them. The majority of it seemed to be research that her father had been working on for up and coming stories in the Quibbler, but the farther back in the boxes Luna read, the more disturbing the information became. Instead of letters from readers trying to help Xenophilius discover rare creatures, Luna found herself reading cut out articles from old Daily Prophets from the First War.

'**He Who Must Not Be Named Defeated. Ministry Searches for Death Eaters Still in Hiding'**

'**Malfoy Mansion Raided in the Middle of Night. Whole Family to Stand before Wizengamot.'**

The articles were faded and only the headlines remained, but Luna continued to go through the final box of her father's belongings. At the bottom, Luna found a worn leather journal lying beside a small pensieve. Something made Luna hesitate to pull these two objects out of the box. A sudden chill filled her at the site of these two things, and for some reason she had the urge to shove everything back into the box and lock the bedroom door for good.

_"But you're so close to finding out the truth,"_ that same small voice urged her.

"But if I don't like what I find?" Luna asked the dark room as she stared into the box at the pensieve and the journal.

_"You deserve to know the truth…no matter what it may be."_

Luna took a deep breath and pulled the small pensieve out of the box and set it on the floor in front of her. _"Seeing it would probably come as less of a shock than reading it. There's no way I can make it worse by imaging what he's writing about,"_ Luna thought as she leaned forward and began to feel herself slip into her father's memories.

_ "Do you swear to serve The Dark Lord until the day your heart stops beating? Do you swear to help rid our world of the Muggle abominations that call themselves wizards? Do you swear to obey Lord Voldemort's wishes and commands?"_

_ "I swear."_

_ "Then rise, and take the mark of The Dark Lord."_

_**"Where am I?" Luna wondered as she stood at the edge of a large circle of hooded figures. She turned to the person to her immediate right and peered inside the hood of their cloak. **_

_** Luna took a step back into the midst of the circle. Their face was covered by a mask. A mask very similar to the ones the Death Eaters had worn in the Department of Mysteries and at the Battle of Hogwarts. She turned to her left and saw that the figures on that side wore the same kind of masks. Around and around she turned, searching for anyone who's face was not hidden behind one of the hideous masks of Voldemort's followers.**_

_** "Why would father have a memory of this?" Luna asked herself as she stood in the middle of the circle, still vainly searching for someone who's face wasn't hidden behind a mask. In front of her was Lord Voldemort, sitting atop a silver chair at the head of the circle.**_

___"Xenophilius Lovegood."_

_ "Yes, my Lord."_

_**Luna spun around, her breath catching in her throat. It couldn't be. Standing before Luna, bowing low before Lord Voldemort, was her father. There was no denying it.**_

_** "**__Do you swear to serve The Dark Lord until the day your heart stops beating? Do you swear to help rid our world of the Muggle abominations that call themselves wizards? Do you swear to obey Lord Voldemort's wishes and commands?"_

_**"No. No. No." Luna whispered, tears forming in the corners of her eyes.**_

_** Xenophilius Lovegood looked up, straight into Luna's eyes. **__"I swear."_


End file.
